The Balistrieri Tapes, Part 1: 'Balistrieri built empire with threats, violence'
“The Balistrieri Tapes” was a twelve-part series originally published in the Milwaukee Sentinel beginning Oct. 31, 1988. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel is republishing select excerpts from the series.
Frank Balistrieri died in 1993 and his son Joseph Balistrieri died in 2010. His son John Balistrieri was released from prison in 1989, after the publication of this series. In 2014, the Wisconsin Supreme Court denied John Balistrieri’s request to reinstate his law license despite the recommendation of a court-appointed referee who said his conduct had been exemplary since his release.
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Far from power and prestige, his todays aren't like his yesterdays.
He used to have hundreds of thousands of dollars lying around. Now he rooms with another man.
Working and playing all night, he used to sleep into the afternoon. Now he is required to get up at 6 a.m. Commanding respect, he lived a life filled with people he ordered around. Now he is told when he can eat and when he can sleep.
Not long ago threats could be made, and money could be skimmed, and murders could be discussed, and crime was his business. Now he wears surplus military clothing.
Milwaukee's most famous gangster is federal prisoner No. 01877-045. At the age of 70, Frank Peter Balistrieri mops floors.
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Nearly 25 years ago, Balistrieri declared that people must listen to him.
"Everybody knows that (or) they die," he said. "And they'll die, that's all there is to it."
He made that threat during a bugged meeting with criminal associates in an East Side office. He presided. The FBI listened.
"What I want to do is build up a bankroll for the family, for the whole family," he said.
Balistrieri, the most investigated man in state history, directed a powerful criminal organization that involved itself in gambling, extortion, stolen property and violence, according to federal officials.
Like anyone involved in big business, Balistrieri had production problems, and in a conversation with an associate he did some wishful thinking on how he could "take care of a lot of (them)": It would be nice, he said, to own a cemetery and crematorium.
The way Balistrieri operated his business caused a dispute with his father-in-law, the man who formerly operated the organization. The two of them shouted at each other as the older man pleaded for less bloodshed. That was after a meeting in which Balistrieri threatened to kill two men.
A reporter for The Milwaukee Sentinel learned of these conversations when she spent several months searching public records in Wisconsin, Illinois and Missouri.
She discovered hundreds of pages of previously unreported transcripts and memos and tape recordings made during the 30 years that federal, state and local officials investigated Balistrieri, electronically eavesdropping on him, his family and associates.
This series of stories – the most extensive ever done on organized crime in Wisconsin – is based on those records.
Officials spent millions of dollars investigating Balistrieri, a complex individual who once raised money for charity and used to be invited to picnics of the Common Council: a man who commanded attention, often respectfully attending weddings and funerals in his community; a man who had the telephone numbers of many influential people, including entertainers, important public officials, politicians and prominent union leaders.
"There are a lot of people, even in law enforcement who don't realize how important Frank Balistrieri was to the mob," said Gail T. Cobb, a former FBI agent who infiltrated the Mafia here.
Cunning and influential, Balistrieri had business contacts in many cities, including Fort Lauderdale, Fla.; San Diego; Las Vegas, Nev.; Chicago; and New York City.
Joseph (Joe Bananas) Bonanno, one of the top bosses in the American Mafia in the 1950s and early '60s, visited Balistrieri in Milwaukee and discussed a problem Balistrieri had with a member of the Bonanno organization.
Referring to Bonanno, Balistrieri said, "He showed me power and I showed him respect."
Balistrieri's parents were Sicilian immigrants. His father was a cinder hauler and trucker.
Balistrieri was married in 1939, after he withdrew from classes at Marquette University. He went back to Marquette, but withdrew a second time in 1941.
He had different ideas about a career. "My idol was Al Capone when I was a kid," he said in a 1980 recording. That's a true story."
Records show that Balistrieri has been deeply involved in crime here since the 1950s, when his father-in-law, John Alioto, was reportedly in charge.
Electronic surveillance of Balistrieri apparently began in the early 1960s. Since then, federal agents recorded him discussing a broad variety of illegal activities, including murder.
In one tape recording, he talked about hijacked furs with Felix (Milwaukee Phil) Alderisio, an enforcer for the Chicago mob. Alderisio, who is dead, was one of the top men in the rackets in Chicago.
In other recordings, Balistrieri indicated he controlled vending machines and had taken a slice of the gambling here and in Kenosha for years.
He also had hidden interests in strip joints, restaurants and bars.
He was a criminal who never carried a gun, but always carried a threat.
In 1964, he was recorded threatening to kill August Maniaci, who didn't die by threat, but by gun in 1975.
FBI agents said he also threatened to kill Sally Papia, a successful local restaurant operator who has friends in organized crime in Chicago and Milwaukee. Balistrieri threatened two employees of Papia, too, according to FBI agents and recorded conversations.
Balistrieri, who was never very successful operating restaurants, seemed to resent Papia's success, federal agents said.
During the past 40 years, Balistrieri knew most of the men who were murdered gangland style in this area, and had disagreements with some of them, according to records.
He was publicly linked in newspaper stories of the day to one of the area's most sensational gangland slayings.
In 1960, Balistrieri had an interest in a bar known as the Brass Rail. Isadore Pogrob, who weighed 370 pounds, managed it from the two bar stools on which he sat.
One night in January, according to the testimony of a police informant, Balistrieri took a phone call at one of his taverns, and then signaled to three men who were sitting at the bar by placing a forefinger beneath his left ear and drawing it across his throat. The men left.
Pogrob's body was found in a ditch in Mequon.
Judging from his conversations and the findings of investigators, Balistrieri's power and influence stretched into high places.
For example, he insisted he controlled Teamster trucking in Wisconsin, Cobb said.
Sometimes, after public officials sought support of the Teamsters in elections, Balistrieri was recorded discussing the candidates, and who he thought could help the family.
His associates contributed to the campaigns of numerous public officials.
Balistrieri also had close ties with some police officers and businessmen.
Nine years ago Balistrieri was recorded arranging for Las Vegas show tickets for a local police officer.
He bragged that he was notified when liquor licenses were changing hands and when some building permits were issued.
Balistrieri also claimed that he paid off police in Kenosha years ago.
In the 1960s, at one of his restaurants, Balistrieri several times feted an IRS agent who was investigating him.
Along with such evidence of his influence, records also contain numerous indications of the money his power brought him.
On a trip to Chicago, a woman traveling with Balistrieri found a grocery sack of money in the trunk of his car.
In one recorded argument over vending machine proceeds, Balistrieri threw $40,000 on the floor and told a Florida mobster that he wanted more money.
By 1980, John Balistrieri, a son of Frank, said that his family was worth $15 million and that it had interests in three restaurants and a hotel, which grossed $379,000 in one year.
Nevertheless, Balistrieri could be cheap. A small man, who patrolled his nightspots in high-priced suits purchased from the dapper side of the rack, he would order the most expensive wine but wouldn't pay the bills, leaving them to his sons.
"He never once comes across with a nickel, not even a pretzel," his son, Joseph P., complained while being recorded in 1980.
And, after federal officials found $200,000 in a safe in a raid, Frank Balistrleri’s wife, Antonina, was recorded as saying:
"I'm a little upset that he had all that .. .. I'm a little upset that I have to look at bargains and every time he gave me a $10 bill, he screams."
When agents raided the Balistrieri house, they found the following items on Mrs. Balistrieri's dresser: a prayer card, a small statue of a saint, a rosary and a police scanner.
During a later conversation that was taped, Mrs. Balistrieri talked about her loyalty, and her husband's failure to return It.
"I make him Jell-O every night," Mrs. Balistrieri said.
But that didn't stop Balistrieri from being a womanizer.
"Well, your father, when he has a new toy, he drops the old Raggedy Ann. And then you know what? When the chips are down and he goes back to the Raggedy Ann, and he thinks the Raggedy Ann is going to be affectionate with him. That's impossible."
Balistrieri had a more benign opinion of himself.
During the investigation that concluded with Balistrieri and his two sons being sentenced to federal prison, Frank was recorded talking about a local businessman.
According to Balistrieri, the man said, "The FBI keeps coming up. They wanna pinch somebody. They keep asking me about you. I said, 'You're a wonderful guy.'"
And Balistrieri replied, "Well, I am."
Balistrieri and his sons have denied the existence of such federally labeled groups as Mafia or La Cosa Nostra.
However, recordings showed 25 years ago that at meetings attended by Balistrieri, mobster terms were used that included the designations of soldiers, caporegime chiefs and consigliere for the top adviser to the crime family.
As long ago as 1960, an FBI memo said:
"Balistrieri has been described as a lieutenant of what in some circles is known as the 'Italian organization' in Milwaukee, which group Is said to coordinate criminal work in Milwaukee and arranges for its members to be available for criminal undertakings in any place in the country …
"The Milwaukee group may be under the direct supervision of a similar group in Chicago, which is headed by Anthony Accardo, who allegedly attended meetings of the Milwaukee organization."
"It has also been alleged that Frank Peter Balistrieri’s uncle, Frank Balistrieri, is among the leadership of the 'Italian organization' in San Diego…. Another uncle, Peter Balistrieri, prior to his death in September 1958 in San Diego…was also in a leadership capacity… Another relative… known as ‘Big Jim’ Balestrere is alleged to have headed the 'Italian organization' in Kansas City.”
Frank Balistrieri was part of a big family. But it often wasn’t a happy family.
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Read the next selected excerpt: The Balistrieri Tapes, Part 2: "Family feud erupted over Balistrieri’s penchant for bloodshed"
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: The Frank Balistrieri Tapes: Part 1 of the Milwaukee Sentinel investigative series
